as the Tyne Gap, is taken to separate the Cheviot system from the
Pennine Chain, which is properly to be described as a wide tract of
hill-country, extending through two degrees of latitude, on an axis from
N. by W. to S. by E. The highest point is Cross Fell (2930 ft.). On the
north-west side of the Pennine system, marked off from it by the upper
valleys of the rivers Eden and Lune, lies the circular hill-tract whose
narrow valleys, radiating from its centre somewhat like wheel-spokes,
contain the beautiful lakes which give it the celebrated name of the
Lake District. In this tract is found the highest land in England,
Scafell Pike reaching 3210 ft. East of the Pennines, isolated on three
sides by lowlands and on the fourth side by the North Sea, lie the
highmoors of the North Riding of Yorkshire, with the Cleveland Hills,
and, to the south, the Yorkshire Wolds of the East Riding. Neither of
these systems has any great elevation; the moors, towards their
north-western edge, reaching an extreme of 1489 ft. in Urra Moor. The
tableland called the Peak of Derbyshire, in the south of the Pennine
system, is 2088 ft. in extreme height, but south of this system an
elevation of 2000 ft. is not found anywhere in England save at a few
points on the south Welsh border and in Dartmoor, in the south-west.
Wales, on the other hand, projecting into the western sea between
Liverpool Bay and the estuary of the Dee on the north, and the Bristol
Channel on the south, is practically all mountainous, and has in
Snowdon, in the north-west, a higher summit than any in England--3560
ft. But the midlands, the west, and the south of England, in spite of an
absence of great elevation, contain no plains of such extent as might
make for monotony. The land, generally undulating, is further
diversified with hills arranged in groups or ranges, a common
characteristic of which is a bold face on the one hand and a long gentle
slope, with narrow valleys deeply penetrating, on the other. Southward
from the Pennines there may be mentioned, in the midlands, the small
elevated tract of Charnwood Forest (Bardon Hill, 912 ft.) in
Leicestershire, and Cannock Chase (775 ft.) and the Clent Hills (928
ft.), respectively north and south of the great manufacturing district
of Birmingham and Wolverhampton. Of the western counties, the southern
half of Shropshire, Herefordshire and Monmouthshire are generally hilly.
Among the Shropshire Hills may be mentioned the isolat